Songwriting shines on Amen Dunes album Love’

Thursday

Jun 12, 2014 at 8:36 AM

By Dana ForsytheWicked Local staff

On his first couple of albums, Damon McMahon favored working alone, crafting hazy psychedelic folk songs for Amen Dunes, then a solo project.Starting work in upstate New York in 2006, he recorded a few tracks on the "Murder Dull Mind" EP. In 2009, after a sabbatical in China, McMahon returned home and released "DIA" and followed up with a more focused release, "Through Donkey Jaw" the following year.On "Love," Amen Dunes' most recent effort, McMahon has teamed up with fellow musicians from Iceage, GodspeedYou! Black Emporer and longtime contributors Jordi Wheeler and Parker Kindred.And this time around, McMahon and crew are cutting through the reverb a bit, revealing a collection of songs that are as insightful as they are pretty. McMahon and crew recently hit the road, with a scheduled gig at Church of Boston on Thursday, June 19.On the lead single "Lonely Richard," a spacey staring-into-the-sun country-rock lope, McMahon's voice leaps out of the thicket of twanging guitars and scraping violins.McMahon recently spoke about his creative process, inspiration and influences, and what it’s like to finally have his third album hit the shelves after two years in the making."I started demo-ing this album in 2012, actually," McMahon said. "It’s been a long series of different attempts to record this record, but after a year and a half of steady work, it’s finally out there."The album began to gel after McMahon decided to start from scratch and began recording in Brooklyn."We kept some ideas but we just went back and forth with different ideas," he said. Sonically, he added, he wanted a clearer approach to "Love." "I wanted to convey a clear energy in the instrumentation, especially."As for the title of the album, McMahon said he wasn’t thinking of the emotional connotation of the word when he chose it."I’d actually started recording this album after a relationship ended," he explained. "It’s not talking about falling in love, it’s really in reference to devotional music."The title track on the album, McMahon said, is also his favorite. The song evolved from a 30-second melody fragment."We tried to record it with just an acoustic but it really wasn’t working," he said. "I’d been listening to ‘Karma’ by Pharoah Sanders and I always wanted to make a song like that.""I played it for the guys in the studio for reference and Jordi on piano and Parker playing we just went for it," he added.The new approach, McMahon said, opened new doors."I’ve been playing with Jordi and Parker for over a decade and they’re my musical brethren," he said. "We just have this unspoken communication and I think you can hear it on that song."As for the next record, McMahon said he’s ready for the challenge."Not to diminish this record, because I love it. But I’m ready for the next one," he said. "I don’t like to look back too much. You can’t."McMahon added that he has about five albums worth of song fragments waiting in the wings, but he has a very specific idea and focus for his next release."There’s a couple things I’m thinking about, but I have this different approach I’m ready to take on," he said. "I’m just not ready to reveal it yet."Dana Forsythe is the editor of the Watertown Tab. Contact him at dforsythe@wickedlocal.com. Follow @WickedLocalArts on Twitter and on Facebook.